Having apparently solved my iChat and Leopard problems with the solutions outlined in Leopard 10.5.1; iChat video and resolving some kernel panics, I was a little surprised a few days later to (a) wake my computer to a kernel panic, and (b) encounter an error when trying to use iChat. Oh well, those would be temporary fixes then, I thought. Actually though, the iChat problems haven’t returned and I suspect were the result of some connectivity problems rather than anything wrong with the system. I don’t know if the kernel panics have returned for good – I’m hoping not.
In the meantime, there is a strange quirk that I’ve noticed with Leopard. Every now and then an application’s minimize button will turn grey and refuse to function. The keyboard shortcut won’t work either. Everything else about the application continues to function without any problems, and closing and re-opening the application brings the minimize button back in all its yellowy glory. I’ve had this happen with just about every application I run, including iChat, Safari and iTunes.
I’m not alone in this, as a search of the Apple Support Discussions reveals.
Firefox has also exhibited some slightly unusual behaviour. Clicking on the Firefox icon in the Dock would open it, but no browser window would appear. That one confused me for a while, until I noticed that as far as Firefox was concerned (that is, as indicated by the Windows menu) two windows were open, one of which had something to do with a Firefox extension I was running (HTML Validator). After closing and opening Firefox a few times, and trying it in different Spaces, the two windows finally appeared. I’ve subsequently switched off the extension, which seems to have solved the problem, even if it hasn’t explained it.
The only other problem I’ve had was needing to re-synchronise all of my .Mac details after logging out of .Mac from System Preferences. I’m not sure why it happened – but simply logging out of .Mac and then logging in again seemed to lose the synchronisation history. I even had to register the computer again (with the same name, which itself caused a warning message). There were no problems merging the data though, and since then everything has been fine – which is the sort of problem I can live with.
Finally, I’ve just come back from visiting my parents and upgrading both of their machines to Leopard. In both cases I followed the default installation method (ie. of upgrading over the existing version of the operating system), and in both cases there appear to be no problems whatsoever. Even their HP ScanJet 4070 Photosmart Scanner still works. I’m impressed.
Tags: .mac, 10.5.1, 4070, firefox, ichat, leopard, minimise, minimize
10 December 2007 at 8:29 pm |
hi, i wonder if you could help?
after upgrading to leopard, i can no longer hear who i’m video chatting to, and they can’t hear me. If we switch to an audio talk only (ie no video), the audio works fine in both directions…..
Don’t know if this is any use, but in connection doctor/stats, audio is always at 0% during video chats…
I’m trying to connect to a mac running tiger
i’ve also deleted all ichat preferences, changed qt streaming to 1.5mbps and ichat b/width limit to none, firewall set to allow all incoming connections
any ideas please
11 December 2007 at 5:21 pm |
I have to admit I’ve not come across that particular error before. The best place to look for an answer is probably the Apple Discussions on iChat in Leopard, available here: http://discussions.apple.com/forum.jspa?forumID=1226
10 February 2008 at 5:47 am |
Thanks for documenting this. I started noticing this a few days ago, and I just did a fresh install of everything (not because of this reason, but primarily because I didn’t trust the upgrade method from Tiger to Leopard).
It appears to be a system-wide issue. Are you by chance using Spaces? I’m not sure if that has anything to do with it, but I’ve noticed this problem in Mail.app, NetNewsWire, Safari, and other apps. Let’s hope this will get resolved in 10.5.2 because this is quite frankly embarrassing and ridiculous.
18 February 2008 at 6:07 pm |
Hopefully everyone’s running 10.5.2 by now as well as Leopard Graphics Update. So far, I’ve yet to see the problem. Let’s hope it stays this way!
26 February 2008 at 3:44 pm |
Update. Sadly, it appears that the grayed out minimize button has returned again.
I’m almost certain that this has to to do with Spaces, especially apps that are maximized within an space.
Either this is a bug, or a “feature” that I’ve failed to understand.
26 February 2008 at 4:34 pm |
Yes, it hasn’t gone away for me either. I’m sure it’s related to Spaces, as I haven’t had the same thing happen on my iBook, which doesn’t have Spaces enabled.
1 March 2008 at 7:06 pm |
I’m having the same problem. How strange. Running Fusion full screen seems to invoke the issue.
13 March 2008 at 5:23 am |
I just started to experience the minimize grayout bug this morning, and I don’t use Spaces on my iMac. I just Googled it and it seems everyone is a bit confused by this one.
30 June 2008 at 9:12 pm |
I’ve had this problem on and off I think since I bought my MacBook Pro a few months ago. SOOO annoying!
30 June 2008 at 9:16 pm |
I just unchecked the “enable spaces” button and low and behold it fixed the minimize buttons. After enabling spaces again it stayed fixed so as a temporary fix I’m just going to make an applescript that disables spaces, enables spaces and sets my spaces hot corner up again.
4 December 2008 at 1:57 pm |
Then, so far no one has the permanent solution for this yet? (Leopard 10.5.5)
12 January 2009 at 4:13 pm |
@Joe,
yes, i started getting this when i went to full-screen in vm fusion (which i did by accident as i do not like full-screen vms). so, i thought i’d try again, and my minimize buttons are back. hmn….